Dispelling the myth of "compassion fatigue."

Show and Tell, But Don’t Retell

Last week I attended an anecdotal lecture on one man’s journey through the Ferghana Valley. This timely event was coordinated by the Center for Russian, East Europe and Central Asia (CREECA) at UW-Madison. Compelled by a personal interest in the region and the impending story deadline of my journalism course, I decided to frame the valuable cultural insight of this speaker’s first-hand account within the tension of state and federal budget cuts that threaten CREECA’s funding. My task as a journalist seemed pretty straightforward.

As an employee of the U.S. Department of Defense, the speaker’s first order of business was to deliver a familiar disclaimer that is mandatory of U.S. governmental employees who wish to share their own experiences and opinions with the public. In my experience as a Peace Corps volunteer, I was required to post the following “warning label” at the top of my blog, Discovering Kyrgyzstan: “The contents of this website are mine personally and do not reflect any position of the U.S. government or the Peace Corps.” As I understand it, the purpose of this claim is twofold. It recognizes the immutability of individual freedom of expression while instituting a legal buffer between itself and internal voices that may damage its image.

I proceeded to record his presentation, which mainly centered on a PowerPoint display of his photos and personal narration. Likewise, the associate director of CREECA took an audio recording of the lecture to be archived on the centers website. Afterwards, I approached the speaker for a brief interview, prodding him to articulate his motivation behind delivering an informal type of show-and-tell presentation.

To establish an initial sense of trust, I introduced myself by referencing our shared experiences with Central Asian culture. I also asked his for permission to record our interview and informed him that this material would be used in a school assignment. Seeing no restrictions on quoting experiences and were expressly his own, I neglected to mention my additional intentions to publish this story in one of the school papers.

I pumped out an 800-word story the next day and emailed the speaker for a couple photos to be paired with it. In place of photos, his initial reply included a concerned inquiry into purpose of the story. He mentioned that the lecture was meant to be “off the record/non-attributable.” Because he works for the Department of Defense, he would need special permission from their sector of public affairs. This meant that I could still submit it for a school assignment, but I could no longer publish it for a larger audience.

I would have easily missed this stipulation, had I not contacted him for photos in a follow-up email. What repercussion would I have faced for publishing this article? How would this article have affected the speaker’s career? What are the ethical ramifications of such governmental control over its cultural ambassadors?